In a 1940 interview with the Villager, Hirst recalled starting painting lessons at the age of ten and attending dance school alongside a young William Howard Taft.

[6] Hirst rented a studio in Greenwich Village where she befriended landscape painter William Crothers Fitler.

[7] Whilst in New York, Hirst taught art and took private lessons from Agnes Dean Abbatt, Charles Courtney Curran, and George Henry Smillie.

Her bachelor still lifes incorporated elements such as books, candles, newspapers, and meerschaum pipes arranged on a wooden table.

"[8] According to Christine Crafts Neal, Hirst's 1890s work, A Gentleman's Table "recalls the 17th-century Dutch tradition of the moralizing (vanitas) still-life composition.

According to art historian Martha Evans, works in the oeuvre of contemporaries Peto and Harnett typically condoned the male culture that was represented and rarely offered depictions of alcohol.

Evans relates that while Hirst's work was commissioned by a men's club in Chicago, she offers a subtle criticism of the male pursuits of gambling and drinking.

The overturned bottles, the cards strewn about the table and the abandonment of a pyramidal composition create a sense of disarray in the work.